Friday, March 28, 2025
There was anticipation around a possible Baldwin-Elmont boys’ basketball county championship game from the moment the Bruins moved into the same classification with the reigning New York State champions. That buzz only grew throughout the season, a meeting in the Baldwin Holiday Classic adding to the hype.
By the time the squads stepped on the court Saturday evening with the Nassau Class AA title on the line, the gym at Farmingdale State College was packed with fans lucky enough to witness an instant classic.
Every possession was monumental, every loose ball and rebound was fiercely contested. It came down to the final seconds and when it was over, Baldwin won 47-44, to capture a fifth straight county title.
New classification, same story for Baldwin.
“This one is definitely special,” said Chase Timberlake, who scored a game-high 18 points. “They’re the state champions, us moving down a division, it didn’t mean nothing. We’re still doing the same thing. This is like our home away from home. This is the norm for us at the end of the day.”
Baldwin head coach Darius Burton heard the doubters this season. Two starters from last year’s squad transferred out, there were 10 first-year players on a team that lost many of their marquee non-league games, including that late December defeat to Elmont.
But as the Spartans found out, beating Baldwin in March is much harder than in December.
“It was a knockdown fight. I told him that we won the war tonight, and I didn’t lie,” Burton said. “Coach [Ryan] Straub and Elmont, defending state champs. He does a great job every year. That’s why he’s invited to my tournament every year. They bring out the best in us. They got us in December, I told them we wanted to pay them back, had the opportunity to do it, and we did it. But it came down possession by possession.”
The key to another county title, Burton said, was defense. It’s always been Baldwin’s DNA, but that was ratcheted up in the postseason where the Bruins gave up just 42.2 points a game.
Defense is also Elmont’s calling card and that, too, was on display in the pressure-packed championship game.
The second-seeded Spartans (19-4) held fifth-seeded Baldwin (17-7) to 10 second-quarter points and just nine in the third quarter, taking a 34-31 lead into the fourth.
But the Bruins turned up the intensity defensively in the fourth quarter, limiting Elmont to 10 points in the fourth quarter with the second-seeded Spartans making just two field goals.
“It was a real close game and we just didn’t make enough big plays down the stretch,” Straub said. “Give Baldwin a lot of credit. They made a few more plays than us. I’m incredibly proud of our seniors. They’ll forever be state champions and led us to another great season.”
Still, Arlyn Brown (team-high 13 points) had a chance to tie the score at 45 when he was fouled on an attempted 3-pointer, but the Elmont guard went 2-of-3 from the foul line with 16 seconds remaining.
Timberlake was fouled on the other end and buried both of his free throws with 8.8 seconds left and Gabriel Phillips (10 points) solidly defended Ebubenna Nwabudu’s desperation 3-pointer at the buzzer to secure yet another county title.
“We’re not the greatest offensive team, but our best offense is our defense,” Burton said. “And we got stops in the fourth quarter when we needed to. We held them to five points in the first quarter when we needed to.”
